Every Dawn Forever (13 page)

Her arousal spiked in the air suddenly, and his body responded.  In spite of the dangerous situation, he wanted nothing more than to shut them all down in the den and bond her to them forever.

He pressed his lips to hers firmly but swiftly and said, “When this is over and you’re fully free, sweetheart, we’re going to have a very serious discussion about our future together.”

“Alaska?” she asked, licking her lips as if she wanted to taste him again.

“We’ll take you for a visit, but you’re sure as hell not living there.”

She blinked a few times and tears slipped over her cheeks, but in spite of her fear over facing her ex, she smiled.  “If I say no?”

He grinned.  “You like us.  Admit it.”

She laughed shakily.  “I do.  I don’t want to be anywhere but here.  But I’m scared, Orion.”  The amusement left her eyes immediately and he released her face and pulled her into his arms.

“We’ll handle it, sweetheart.”

No matter what, they were going to set her free.  No.  Matter.  What.

* * * * *

Sterling considered shifting into his human form about a hundred times while Orion bared his soul to Sydney, but he had a feeling that it was better for them all for Orion to talk to her alone.  When the dust settled from this situation with her ex, then they could all talk.  Orion covered Sydney back up with the towel and led her to the bed, where she sat down on the edge, wrapping her arms around herself.  Orion disappeared into the back rooms, and Sterling padded over to her, nudging her knee with his muzzle.

Her hand dropped down to his head and she stroked his ear.

Orion returned from the back and announced that he had called Jan and told her that everything was under control here and that he would be in touch when the situation was neutralized.  The security system beeped and alerted them that the others had come back and Cairo had opened the door for them.  When it was reengaged with another reassuring beep, the sound of many paws padding down the stairs made him smile inwardly.  He didn’t think any hyenas ever went into the winter den in their beast forms.  Nearly their entire
baro
was still in their shifts.  Crux joined him, resting his furry chin on Sydney’s knees.

Cairo said, “We don’t know how many wolves are out there, but we need to be prepared to fight.”

Her eyes widened and her whole body jerked, as if she hadn’t thought of them fighting.  He wanted to spend the rest of his life worshipping her in every possible way, but as her mate, he would die before he let her be harmed.  She slipped down to the carpet and wrapped her arms around his and Crux’s necks, holding on as if her life depended on it.  “Don’t die,” her voice cracked as she pressed her face against his neck.  Her tears wet his fur and he could feel her body trembling.  “Please.”

Orion knelt next to them.  “We’ll come back to you, Sydney.”

More than putting a personal pounding on the guy, Sterling wanted her to really know that she was free.  Once and for all.  Good and done.

While she leaned on them, Orion had gone upstairs and brought clothes down for Sydney.  Sterling walked with Sydney into the bathroom, worried that she was so strung out she might faint.  After she pushed her feet into her sneakers, he walked with her back into the main area of the den.

“I’m going to shift again and go find those bastards.  Mase and Crux will stay down here in the den with Alyssa and Sydney,” Orion said.

Sterling chuffed in agreement.  Although the den in Dante’s home was far more fortified, the address was compromised since it was the one that had been given to her former mate via the young cousin.  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that her former mate could easily follow her scent through the woods, so moving her out of the safety of their own den was not going to happen.

Sydney said, “How can you shift again so quickly?”

“I’m your mate, sweetheart.  My beast is howling at me to keep you safe.  It’s all I can do right now to stay in my human form.”

Orion hugged and kissed Sydney, whispering something in her ear, and then looked down at Crux.  “Keep her safe, brother.”

Crux gave a short bark and stayed close to Sydney.

She looked down at Sterling and tears slipped down her cheeks.  He wished he could speak in his shifted form.  “Come back to me, Sterling,” she said in a rough whisper.

He growled and rubbed his cheek against her knee.  “We’ll be back when you’re safe,” Orion said.

“Promise?”

“Promise,” Orion said solemnly.

Sterling and Orion left her with Crux, Alyssa, and Mason, and joined the others who had already gone upstairs and outside.  Orion shut the basement door and engaged the electronic locking mechanism.  Thick steel bars inside the door shifted on gears and stretched across the door and into the wall, locking it solidly.  Sterling moved out of the house and waited as Orion closed and locked the back door and checked that the alarm was on.  Orion tossed the towel around his waist aside and shifted quickly, as if his beast couldn’t get back into his furred form quickly enough.  Orion gave a sharp bark and he leapt off the porch, and Sterling followed as the
baro
headed into the woods to find the ones that had harmed their mate.

* * * * *

Hearing the basement door’s steel beams lock was reassuring to Crux.  He was honored to be guarding Sydney and Alyssa with Mason, but he wished he could bring final justice for her.

Sydney looked so worn out.  She’d been looking forward to shifting and hunting.  She hadn’t said exactly what her past full moons were like, but judging from her excitement at this first full moon of freedom, she hadn’t had any more freedom in her shift than in her human form.  He was sorry that her first full moon with them had been cut short, and he wished that she could just rest now, but it wasn’t a good time to be napping.

Alyssa joined Sydney where she sat on the edge of the bed.  “How are you holding up, Syd?”

Sydney looked at him and he closed the short distance to her and put his head in lap again.  She stroked his neck.  “Worried as hell.”

“They’re going to be fine.   There isn’t anything that hyenas won’t do to make sure that their mate is safe.”

Sydney didn’t respond, and Crux could tell by the way her brow was furrowed that she was in deep thought.  He’d spent the last few weeks watching her and had grown very attuned to her emotions.  Growling softly, he pressed closer to her leg.

Time leaked by slowly and he wished he had a way of communicating with his brothers.  They hadn’t been in the house long enough to really get the den set up the way that they would need, with surveillance cameras inside and outside of the house.  Sterling was the one that liked to do all the electronic tinkering.  Before Sydney came into their lives, they thought they didn’t need to worry about really using the den and thinking about their mate’s security.  But now, he would give one of his fangs to have a security camera outside.  He wondered if they’d had to go searching for the wolves.  He wondered how many there were and if they were in their shifts or human forms.

The lights flickered and then went out completely.  Sydney’s hand tightened against his fur.  The generator kicked on and the lights in the den slowly came back on one by one.  His fur raised on his neck.  There was no storm billowing outside to cause the power to go out.  The only reason it would go out tonight was because someone had cut the power.  And there wasn’t anyone in their
baro
that would do such a thing.  Which meant that at least one wolf knew they were inside the house.

Chapter 11

The floor above them creaked once and Sydney’s blood went cold.  Someone was walking around in the house.

Alyssa tensed next to her.  Sydney drew her free arm around Alyssa and they held each other.  Crux chuffed at her and moved silently towards the steps.  He’d made it about halfway up them when there was a strange sound from the top of the stairs, like a circuit being shorted.

Alyssa let out a quick breath.  “I think someone just disabled the lock.”

Sydney held her breath, unsure what was going to happen.  She waited for the door to burst open and wolves to flow down the stairs.  But there was nothing for several minutes.  The den was entirely silent.  Crux was still midway up the stairs, his ears pricking as if he was picking up minute sounds that they couldn’t hear.

Boom!

Something hit the door to the basement, hard.  The sound was loud enough that her ears rang.

“Do you have your phone so we can call the police?”  Sydney asked.  Her phone was upstairs in the bedroom on the dresser.

Alyssa cursed.  “No, damn it.  Is there a landline down here?”

“In the office I think,” Sydney said, bolting off the bed as the loud thuds against the door increased in pace.  She didn’t want to believe that it was her former mate up there, hitting the door with something big and heavy, trying to get down to her.  But she was really afraid that it was.

Alyssa was on her heels.  Sydney snagged the phone off the desk, put it up to her ear, and heard nothing.  After pressing the button a few times, hoping a dial tone would come on, she finally hung up.

“Dead.”

A cracking noise came after a particularly loud thud and both women looked at each other.  The door wasn’t going to hold.  Where were the others?  She didn’t believe for a moment that they were all dead.  More likely, they were chasing the wolves away from the house.

Mason and Crux came racing into the office.  They barked and growled, tossing their heads back towards the hallway.  Without needing real words, Sydney knew that they wanted them to follow, so they did.  Mason nudged open the bathroom door and Sydney went in first and turned on the light and Alyssa joined her.  Crux stared at her, his eyes glowing and his teeth bared.

“Be careful,” she whispered and he nodded once.  She shut the door and locked it.  Alyssa sat down on the toilet lid and rubbed at her extended belly, and Sydney sat down on the floor with her back to the door.

“They won’t let anything happen to us,” Alyssa said.  From the tone of her voice, Sydney figured Alyssa was saying that as much for Sydney’s benefit as her own.  And she did believe that.  She’d seen the truth in Sterling’s eyes earlier.  He would die for her safety.  And he wasn’t the only one.

When the door gave way several minutes later, the cracking sound reminded Sydney of the time that her former mate had broken her arm.  It was a sickening sound, sharp and painful, and knowing that it was most likely her former mate who had broken the door just made the parallel that much closer to the truth.

Snarls came first.  Then growling that was low and deep.  And then the sounds of fighting.  Something tipped over and broke. She strained to hear each sound, her heart pounding in her chest and her face wet with tears.

A yelp sounded, and something told her that it wasn’t her former mate that was injured but either Mason or Crux, since she hadn’t heard that sound ever before from a wolf.

Straightening, she moved to the cabinet under the sink and pushed open both doors, staring at the contents.  Her fear was as real as anything she’d ever experienced, but she wasn’t going to sit in the bathroom while her mate was killed by her psychotic ex.  If Crux was going down, then she was going to go down with him.  Or take his place if she could.  Because as much as they would go to their grave for her safety, in that moment she knew that she would go to her grave for them.

All she saw under the cabinet were cleaning products.  She didn’t think she could hurt her former mate with scrubbing bubbles or a Magic Eraser.  But then a black spout caught her eye and she reached for it, pulling out a can of ant spray.

Alyssa said, “They had ants down here when they first put the basement in.  What are you doing?”

Turning the nozzle into the open position, she pointed it away from them and pressed the button on top.  A thick mist whooshed from the can.  Already she could smell the chemicals and her eyes teared up.  Letting up she looked at Alyssa.  “You’re the sister I wish I had, and the friend that I’m so glad to have met.”

Alyssa grabbed her hand.  “What are you doing?”

“I’m going to fight.”

“We’re supposed to stay here,” she protested.

“You stay.  This is my fight, too.”

Swiftly kissing Alyssa on the cheek, Sydney unlocked the door and scooted through quickly, pressing the lock on the handle before pulling it closed.  It was now or never.  She was going to go out there and face her former mate and…do something with the ant spray in hopes of buying some time for the others to realize what was going on.

Easing down the short hallway, she looked into the main room and saw serious destruction.  The kitchen table and chairs were turned over, lamps were broken, the bed was in disarray.  One wolf and one hyena fought — another hyena was lying to the side, trying to lift his head.  She recognized Crux as the hyena that was still fighting, and the wolf in question was most definitely her former mate.  His back was to her but she knew his markings.